Circus Fit Intensive
Aerial Intensive Retreat
Circus School in a Week!
Aerial Skills & Drills, Conditioning, Pilates, Flexibility, Anatomy, Injury Prevention
with Teachers Kerri Kresinski & Dakota Rooney
Casa Chango Mexico, Puerto Escondido
August 10-17, 2024
BIPOC Scholarship Available. Apply here by April 15.
The purpose of this retreat – Learn how to train (& have fun)!
CIRCUS Fit Intensive Retreat is for anyone who loves aerial arts and wants to understand how to train more efficiently, effectively, and have fun doing it.
This retreat will help you:
- focus your training practice towards making steady progress
- use technique, strength, and active mobility to execute skills and tricks more efficiently and beautifully.
- create muscle memory bringing your practice into your body and out of your head
- use cross-training to improve your aerial skills
- create a sustainable, life-long aerial practice
Classes
Morning classes include aerial skills, drills, and conditioning exercises for balanced training. Skills classes will be focused on solidifying and drilling intermediate level foundational skills and technique on various apparatuses. Conditioning classes include drills that will support your skills and the resilience of your body. Please note that the focus of this retreat is not on flashy ‘tricks’ and fancy sequences. Instead, you will learn the foundations to make your flashy tricks safer, smoother, more dynamic, and essentially more flashy!
Afternoon classes explore Pilates/core for aerialists, flexibility, cross training for shoulder health, and tools for training at home. These floor skills directly compliment your aerial work and will change your aerial practice. Functional anatomy for aerialists workshop will also be included. Open gym is available outside of class times.
There will be plenty of time to swim, relax, and adventure!
Who should come?
Aerial Students
This retreat focuses on solidifying and refining foundational techniques of aerial training at the intermediate level to enhance your skills and your practice. Aerial students at the strong beginner through advanced level can benefit from this retreat. This retreat is not appropriate for total beginners in aerial arts.
Aerial Teachers
Aerial Teachers and aspiring teachers can up their game at this retreat. Kerri and Dakota will give you new approaches to teaching, smarter progressions, more efficient techniques, and new perspectives on a well rounded practice. Your students (and future students) will be grateful that you came!
August 10-17, 2024
BIPOC Scholarship Available.
Daily Schedule Sample: Everything is optional!
- 7:30-9:30 am: Coffee, Tea and Breakfast
- 9:30-10am : Applied Anatomy & Coffee
- 10am-12pm: Warm up & Aerial Drills/Skills
- 12-1pm: Functional Conditioning & Body Awareness
- 1pm: Lunch
- 2-5pm: Pool-time, siesta, relaxing
- 3:30pm: Afternoon Treat
- 4-5pm: Open Gym/SkillShare
- 5-6:30pm: Pilates, Flexibility, Cross-Training for Shoulders (push vs pull)
- 7pm Dinner
- 8-10pm Evening activities
We will take you to our favorite local beaches, our local night market, and to release baby turtles into the sea. There are evening adventures to a bioluminescent lagoon and local night market.
Prerequisites
You should have an understanding of and be able to execute the following skills (note: you do not have to do these skills perfectly. It can be ugly and messy.
Aerial Silks & Straps
- Bent arm hold 5 seconds
- Climb up using feet and arms
- Inverted pencil
- Straddle invert
- Hip key
- Any foot wrap
Lyra or Trapeze
- Bent arm hold/upper pull up 5 seconds
- Invert – straddle and/or tuck
- Knee hang
- Front hip hang to sit
- Sitting to front hip hang
- Front balance
- Sit to stand on bottom bar
August 10-17, 2024
BIPOC Scholarship Available.
About our Teachers
Kerri has been performing and teaching acrobatics, dance, and aerial arts for over 25 years. Her life’s work, as an artist and teacher, has been to develop and deepen her study of the body. She has learned that anything is possible with patience, discipline and a positive attitude.
Kerri teaches her students how to own their practice. Focusing on fundamental elements of technique, anatomy, and the physics of movement, her students learn how to train. Kerri goes beyond teaching skills and sequences. She teaches how to identify, alter, and create your own skills and sequences, and best of all how to fully embody the movement of each skill in the most satisfying way for the doer and the viewer. Technique, balance, stability, mobility, movement pathways, creativity, 360 degree movement, musicality, originality, intentional movement, elements of surprise and awe, and a deep connection to humanity is what you will get if you work with Kerri.
Kerri’s technical expertise comes from working with students of all ages, shapes, sizes, and challenges.
You can find Kerri’s performance videos here and Circus Fit free online tutorial videos here. Find Kerri on Instagram @SweetCircusKerri.
Dakota has been involved in the circus world for over 30 years. She has performed around the world as an aerialist at circus shows, corporate events, theatrical productions, art museums and galleries, film, nightclubs and with international music acts. She is a seasoned performer of multiple aerial acts- solo, double, and group, as well as partner acrobatics. Dakota has been coaching aspiring aerialists of all ages since the late 1990’s. As a coach, she has created acts, choreographed and coached aerialists across the United States and abroad. She was mentored and trained in coaching technique, spotting, aerial curriculum development, and skills progression by Sandrine DePlanque. Dakota has trained in rigging and safety for aerialists with Jonathan Deull. Dakota is a Kane School certified Pilates instructor. She brings a strong knowledge of anatomy and biomechanics to her coaching style. Dakota had the honor of a work study position at FAMI (Functional Anatomy for Movement and Injuries) at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. She has returned twice to receive deeper training in rehab of the spine and shoulder.
Dakota and Kerri met at a retreat in 2019 and immediately discovered that they have complimentary teaching styles. They share wisdom of the body and how to use it most efficiently. They have been teaching together at retreats and residencies ever since.
Kerri is hands-down the best aerials instructor I’ve ever had. In our retreat, we had some students with 3 months of experience and some 7 years, and somehow she gave us all personalized attention and narrowed in immediately in each of our needs. She has an unparalleled knowledge of the human body and how to create a safe, sustainable aerials practice. Whether you are just getting started, or having been practicing for years, Kerri helps take your practice to the next level and teaches wrap theory in a way that makes learning new moves at any studio more feasible. All her classes are energetic and fun, often featuring easy cardio dance routines that double as specific muscle warmups. After working with Kerri in one residency, I was so hooked I came back for a second. She is a one-in-a-million teacher, who really lives eats and breathes her craft, and it shows!
Sophie Sandweiss, 2022
Classes/ Activities include:
Aerial Technique & Drills
Aerial Conditioning
Pilates for Aerialists
Pushing for Aerialists
Flexibility
Partner Stretching
Functional Anatomy
Injury Prevention
How to Create a Home Practice that Supports your Aerial Training
What’s included:
- Ground transportation to/from the Puerto Escondido Airport (PXM) to our accommodations*
- August 10-17: Arrive on Aug 10. Depart on Aug 17.
- Accommodations for the duration of the retreat
- Daily meals – breakfast, lunch, dinner, & desserts and treats!
- 3 daily classes
- Applied anatomy workshop
- Aerial photoshoot (with up to 15 photos)
- Trips to a local beaches and markets
- Baby turtle release excursion
- Trip to our local night market
- 24 hour use of swimming pool and community space
- Evening Jacuzzi soaks
- Starlink Wifi Internet
Retreat Pricing in USD
| Room | Early Bird Price | Full Price |
| Shared Dorm (up to 4 people) | $2000 | $2300 |
| Shared room w shared bathroom (1 king size or 2 individual beds) booking with a friend | $2200 | $2500 |
| Shared room w private bathroom (1 king size or 2 individual beds) booking with a friend | $2300 | $2600 |
| Private room with shared bathroom | $2500 | $2800 |
| Private room w private bathroom | $2800 | $3100 |
| Private room w private bathroom & air conditioning | $3100 | $3400 |
$500 Deposit is required to secure your spot.
Early bird prices end 3 months before the first day of the retreat.
Full tuition is due by one month before the first day of the retreat.
Rates refer to cost of one person’s tuition.
Couples must sign up together.
Significant others and friends who are not taking classes are welcome at a special price.
Dorms are mixed gender.
Click here for room descriptions.
Deals and Discounts
- Book and pay early and save $300!
- Refer a friend to any of our retreats and save $100 with our referral discount.*
- Sweet Retreats Alumni discount $200.
August 10-17, 2024
BIPOC scholarship available.
Links for more information:
- Accommodations
- Meals and Food
- Getting Here – Travel Advice
- Weather in Puerto Escondido
- Testimonials
- Excursions
- Registration FAQ’s
Email SweetRetreatsMexico@gmail.com with any questions.
Student Testimonials
I was absolutely blown away by the insane amount of love, care and expertise I experienced at Casa Chango!
Trish Lamanna Oct 2023
I signed up for the 1 week lyra intensive and it not only improved the integrity of my movements, strength and confidence, it also immersed me in a group of the best humans I’ve ever had the privilege of meeting and learning with.
Kerri and Dakota are completely inspiring with the amount of care, expertise and embodied insight they share based off of decades of movement art experience. Eli, Marcel, Stu and the rest of the Casa Chango staff are incredible humans that put so much love into what they do. Also, the food is amazing!!! I’m very grateful I was able to experience this retreat with everyone involved, I miss everyone already and highly recommend it to anyone considering a retreat experience. You will not regret it!!
Kerri imbues her classes with a really sweet combination of focused work, zany playfulness, and an earthy and body-positive sensuality. I walked away from my time as Kerri’s student more capable, skilled, and excited not just about aerial, but about the journey to reaching my goals. I typically have given myself a hard time– about a number of things in life– including my journey with aerials. Kerri is skilled and optimistic, is genuinely there for you, and 100% rooting for you to “get that thing” and if you’re not there yet, can show you what needs to be done to get you to progress. She knows the value of the hard or ugly work, but she knows how to do it in a way that is fun and full of compassion for yourself and your journey. I truly appreciate this woman and friend, and I now know that my time at Sweet Retreats was a workshop on many levels, and not just in the air.
Elizabeth Ferretti, April 2019
An unbelievable experience for those who are seeking to level up. Taught by two of the most experienced aerialists and very well managed by an amazing crew. I really enjoyed my stay, learned a ton and made some great friends!
Soroush, Oct 2023
I had such a great time during my 1 week intensive Lyra focused retreat and I highly recommend it to everyone! The education and training I received from Kerri and Dakota were already worth the investment. They are experts in their field and even better at teaching. Casa chango felt like a 2nd home. I loved the food, staff, people, rooms, and the views!
Maleia Rose, Oct 2023
Circus bootcamp (former Circus Fit Intensive) was life changing for my practice. I used to not like going to the gym because I didn’t know how to use it to help me with circus stuff, but the retreat gave me the tools to train. I also learned to be more kind to myself about training which helped me come at it with a different strategy. Hearing about your process and how you got to where you are was a huge inspiration for me to honor my own process.”
Morgan Tarling, San Francisco, CA 2016
Sweet Retreats has encouraged me to be a better version of myself both physically in the circus arts and also personally in my interactions with friends and the community. The instructors at Sweet Retreats are not only world class performers, they are also some of the most caring, beautiful, and authentic individuals. I’m so fortunate to have discovered this paradise of athletic endeavors, delicious food, unending laughter, and all within the gorgeous surrounding.
– LIZ MAROTTE, OAKLAND, CA
I just completed Kerri’s Sweet Retreats Circus Fit Intensive Retreat and I just can’t wait to do another one. It was an amazing and life changing experience. This was an all levels week long retreat in Puerto Escondido Mexico. I was a little nervous coming in as a beginner but Kerri and Dakota made me feel so welcome and confident. I learned so much and feel so much stronger. I have come away with so many tools to improve my practice. The whole week was planned so meticulously and Kerri is so organized. Everything ran smoothly. Kerri and her husband Stu (who is the incredible chef/photographer there) are loving professionals who are so much fun and they also really care about their community in Mexico. They support local businesses and are so respectful. Great vibes, great training and great people!! Thank you Kerri xoxo
Lily Achatz – August 2021
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